ERP competition heating up in Europe

Competition is heating up among vendors in the Western European enterprise resource planning (ERP) applications market, analysts report.

A new IDC study revealed that SAP's overall ERP applications market share made it the leader in all verticals in Western Europe in 2005.

However, at the country level, Oracle and Sage are now challenging SAP's leadership in verticals such as communications, public sector, finance, business services and retail/wholesale in countries such as the UK and France.

"Oracle leaped ahead in its focus industries with its acquisition of PeopleSoft," said Bo Lykkegaard, programme manager for Western European enterprise applications at IDC.

"But Sage has improved its position across most verticals via its domination of the small and midsize company segment in Europe by acquisitions and organic growth."

According to the report, manufacturing makes up approximately 40 per cent of the total ERP applications market, with discrete manufacturing being significantly larger than process manufacturing.

Retail/wholesale is the third largest ERP industry segment. Traditional IT intensive industries, financial services and communications make up only 15 per cent of the market when combined. The public sector makes up another 15 per cent.

"IDC sees further industry concentration ahead in the ERP applications market," added Lykkegaard.

"This concentration will largely be acquisition-driven. Infor's recent acquisitions of SSA Global, Geac and Systems Union will catapult it ahead in the manufacturing and distribution sectors."

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